Years of advocacy and motion for an equitable music business is dropping traction, and the laborious yards gained are susceptible to being misplaced.
That’s the warning from Vicki Gordon, founding govt producer and program director of the Australian Women In Music Awards and Convention, who used the platform of Oztix’ Queensland Day operate final Thursday (June 6) to current a powerful case.
“With little or no assets,” she says of AWMA, “we’ve got efficiently constructed an alternate platform and been a visual and clear mannequin of the behavioural change wanted throughout the sector I’ve had a protracted profession in music and a protracted profession making an attempt to create change and sadly in 2024; we look like going backwards.”
Gordon and her colleagues are “very involved about music pageant line ups being dominated generally totally by male artists, male musicians, male techs and male lead bands,” she continues, and pointed to the male-dominated 2024 APRA Music Awards as “very alarming.”
The “taking part in area for girls and inventive minorities stays vastly inequitable, little change has occurred and we now discover ourselves at a crucial juncture,” Gordon explains.
The roll-on impact “is mirrored within the absence of ladies acting on stage, working as operators and designers in entrance of home audio and lighting, as mixing engineers and in different technical areas, again stage as stage managers, roadies, behind the scenes and extra.”
Gordon, who was hand to obtain from Oztix the “Business Trailblazer” award for her tireless work within the business, additionally introduced the completion of a three-year partnership to maintain AWMA in Brisbane.
“My purpose, by means of AWMA,” she informed friends at Oztix’s headquarters in Meanjin/Brisbane, which included reps from authorities, tourism, occasions and extra, “is to go away a long-lasting legacy of inspiration for future generations and by working collectively I consider we’ll just do that.”
And that crucial change, she insists, can solely occur with the help of males from throughout the business.
Oztix saluted Gordon and a number of other long-standing members of the workforce as a part of the annual Qld Day festivities, introduced on the unbiased ticketing chief’s headquarters. Oztix managing director and co-founder Stuart Subject used the event to share an replace on the enterprise he and Brian “Smash” Chladil began 20 years in the past; the hurdles dealing with the stay business with discretionary spend and different components; and teased a forthcoming DIY characteristic for grassroots companies.
Nominations are actually closed for the 2024 Australian Girls in Music Awards, set for Wednesday, Oct. 2, capping a two-day celebration of the achievements of First Nations and culturally numerous girls.
Vicki Gordon
Learn Gordon’s speech in full beneath.
I wish to begin by acknowledging OZTIX and the extraordinary help they’ve offered to AWMA over the previous couple of years.
In right now’s unstable stay music occasions panorama, it has by no means been extra essential for the business to help an Australian owned and operated ticketing company and my heartfelt thanks go to Erin, Kristen, Seth, Stu and Smash.
Brisbane has at all times been a pacesetter in music, my Australian music profession began right here performing in a girls’s punk band referred to as SPIT within the night and dealing at a girls’s rape crises centre in West Finish through the day. AWMA was established in Brisbane in 2018 in response to the power gender inequality throughout all areas of the Australian music business.
With little or no assets we’ve got efficiently constructed an alternate platform and been a visual and clear mannequin of the behavioural change wanted throughout the sector I’ve had a protracted profession in music and a protracted profession making an attempt to create change and sadly in 2024 ; we look like going backwards.
We’re very involved about music pageant line ups being dominated generally totally by male artists, male musicians, male techs and male lead bands and extra not too long ago the male dominated APRA AMCOS award ceremony held in Sydney which was very alarming.
The taking part in area for girls and inventive minorities stays vastly inequitable, little change has occurred and we now discover ourselves at a crucial juncture.
The roll on impact is mirrored within the absence of ladies acting on stage, working as operators and designers in entrance of home audio and lighting, as mixing engineers and in different technical areas, again stage as stage managers, roadies, behind the scenes and extra. I wish to congratulate Brisbane and acknowledge the Qld Authorities for his or her imaginative and prescient and foresight and their honest dedication to gender equality.
It was Premier Anastacia Palaszczuk, Minister Fentiman and Minister Enoch who listened and supported me when nobody else would speak with me and I’m delighted to announce we’ve got not too long ago secured an extra 3 yr partnership to maintain AWMA in Brisbane. And to all the boys within the room who could also be questioning what their position is and should even be feeling a bit of insecure, please know that we wish to work with you, we merely can not make the change which must occur with out your help.
My purpose, by means of AWMA, is to go away a long-lasting legacy of inspiration for future generations and by working collectively I consider we’ll just do that.
Thank-you.
